If you’ve ever played the shell game – one ball and three half coconuts – then you understand the entire charade behind this so-called economic recovery: deception. Let me introduce you to subtraction, addition’s tricky friend! According to astute celebrities like Chris Rock, only in America could a black President lower the unemployment rate to less than 6%, reduce the price of gas to $2.50 a gallon, end two wars – despite accounting for 75% of all casualties and using the exact same timetable as George Bush – and still somehow be considered a failure. Hmm, well that depends on whether or not our color-coded jokester flunked math, bought women drinks with their own money, wore a pirated Che Guevara t-shirt or confused Civics class with his cousin’s repossessed ride.

When 1 + 1 = 3, truth is only as relevant as the name of the IRS seizing your home. In other words, the end justifies the means. Today the Bureau of Labor Statistics announced that unemployment has fallen to a respectable 5.3%; the lowest rate in Barack Obama’s tenure. Unfortunately for both reverse mortgage and Sodoku enthusiasts, the media excluded one teensy-weensy detail; nearly half a million Americans dropped out of the workforce in June alone. Although roughly 223,000 jobs were added – a historically modest number considering the high number of part-time hires – 432,000 Americans crashed out of the workforce and landed directly onto the cushy couch of socialism. In what other universe, fascist state of banned mathematical computation, is a 200,000 net loss a triumph of historic proportions? Even worse, what do you call it when only 60% of the civilian work force is employed full-time? Pocket change”?

In six years alone over 13 million citizens have fallen of the workforce and are no longer counted in the unemployment equation; nearly three times the number of the often assailed George W. Bush. In other words, real unemployed stands near 15% while black unemployment – those alleged beneficiaries of Democratic policies – is well over 20%. Workforce participation is now at a paltry 62.6% and represents the lowest mark since the economic futility of Jimmy Carter. Yet for all the “Blame Bush” rhetoric liberals conveniently invoke to pardon their Marxist messiah, workforce participation never dipped below 65.8% under the former President while median unemployment was 5.4% during his two terms; a number Barack Obama just now surpassed due to near record non-participation, or approximately 100 million Americans not seeking employment. Honestly, how else could welfare recipients skyrocket from 27 million to 48 million, household income plummet by over $3,000 and the national debt nearly double to just under 19 trillion under Barry’s watch alone; because of unprecedented prosperity and unclaimed lottery tickets? If only.

Contrary to the retirement advice of community organizers, true economic recoveries are almost always defined by steep gains due to the inevitable statistical contrast of the recessions they inherently follow. The Reagan years brought annual real GDP growth of 3.5 percent; 4.9 percent directly after the recession. In inflation-adjusted dollars, the GDP jumped from 6.5 trillion at the end of 1980 to 8.61 trillion at the end of 1988. That’s a 32 percent bump and the equivalent of adding the entire West German economy to our own. During the reign of Obamanomics, the GDP has grown at an anemic 9.6 percent…TOTAL…and economic growth under the Great Communicator was easily more than double that of the Great Divider. When over one-third of the country is living paycheck to paycheck, 40% have no retirement savings, and the average savings account balance is below $4000, prosperity becomes an oxymoron of progress; or in government parlance, a lie! You cannot multiple wealth by dividing it through the straw of social justice.

Unless I’m missing the purpose of comedy, like being the butt of a bad joke, perhaps Mr. Rock could tell America what white president was re-elected sporting the same horrific economic record as one Barack Hussein Obama. Care to venture? Not one guess? ZERO! Yes, please excuse me for pulling out my racist calculator and hitting the “O”bama button to clear the pungent air of progressive bean counters. And just in case our talented comic’s false charge is beginning to run on empty, gas was only $1.80 a gallon in 2008. How ironic being that’s about the same time common sense was hijacked, stuffed in the trunk of a Chevy Volt and driven off the cliff in the name of hope. If endless business failures and mass layoffs are a sign of days to come, I suggest we put on our blinker, take a sharp right turn and head straight for the corner of “Wake” & “The Hell Up”! I hear they’re not using our money and the Constitution as confetti to celebrate the planned suffocation of American exceptionalism.